A Plague Of Maladies
by Bellajuku
Summary: It was only a matter of time before the smoking, drinking and horrible karma caught up with him...


_A/N:_

_I don't know what my obsession is with Sick!Asami, I think I just really like writing exasperated Akihito. There's no excuse for this, I wrote it in 20 minutes before I passed out asleep._

_Also to everyone asking about In The Walls I swear I haven't abandoned it I'm just working full time write now and I haven't had an opportunity to sit and write anything serious. I promise I'll pick it up again, maybe over the summer depending on my work _

}{

It wasn't a heart attack.

The doctor had called it a "cardiac distress incident" or some bullshit like that and had tacked it up to stress. He _did not_ sight the incessant smoking, but Akihito would later learn that Asami forbade his physicians from bringing up his personal habits, effectively rendering them helpless. Thus was born the aspirin regiment.

Akihito should have known that it would be a pain in the ass. Asami always teased him for his stubbornness but the reality was that the older man would rather risk his life that be told what to do and it was _so frustrating _that someone he knew only as intelligent and conniving could be so fucking stupid. It was one pill, one little pill a day to thin the blood and prevent an _actual _heart attack, and yet Asami couldn't be assed to take it.

Akihito hadn't even thought to check, had just assumed- wrongly so- that Asami would take the damn things like an adult. It wasn't until about a month later that Akihito was putting together the shopping list and had shaken the bottle to measure it's contents, only to find it completely full.

He left it on the counter, for later discussion.

}{

"Is there a particular reason you won't take them or are you just being a pain in the ass for fun?"

Asami was very good at pretending to ignore him. He _used_ to think he was actually ignoring him, but now he could pick out the subtle shifts in his expression. That, and the bastard could quote a conversation from months ago if it helped him make a point.

He wouldn't respond though, only continued going over the paperwork that was spread across the kitchen counter as if Akihito existed on a completely different plain.

"Should I hide it in some peanut butter? When I was a kid that was how we'd get the beagle to take his heart-worm medication."

That provoked a solid twitch in Asami's brow, so he decided to keep going.

"Or wait, should I roll it up in a cigar so you can smoke it? Cause it's not like _that's _killing you too."

"You know," Asami slanted him a look that was barely a step above abject shunning. "You were the only person I've ever been with who didn't ask me to stop smoking?"

Akihito felt a little twinge at that, but quickly rolled his eyes.

"That's cause I used to _hope _you'd drop dead."

"Or really? What changed?"

"You actually_ did!"_

Finally, _finally_, Asami set down the report he was holding, looking almost contrite.

"I did not 'drop dead' as you put it, I had-"

"A Cardiac-Distress-Incident, yes, I know, I was there. What if next time it _is _a heart attack? What then?"

"There won't be a next time."

Akihito stared at him.

"How can you say that when you've done absolutely nothing to prevent it? God I can see the tabloids now, '_Gold-Digger Trapped When Thousand-Year-Old Husband Dies On Top Of Him_'."

"Your not a gold-digger and I'm thirty-six."

"That's not the point."

"Then what is_?"_

Asami turned to face him all the way, arms folded, and now that he had his full attention Akihito almost wanted to shy away from it, let the whole thing drop. He didn't though.

"I didn't marry some middle-aged salary man that was ready to kick any day. I married Asami Ryuichi."

Asami got that look he always got when Akihito acknowledged their barely legal union: two-parts happy and the third turned-on, but Akihito wan't finished.

"You are a fucking cockroach."

The look disappeared.

"I have seen you get beat up, stabbed, _shot_... remember that time I hit you with the Beamer while Kirishima was teaching me how to park?"

"No, I barely noticed the bruised ribs-"

"_And no matter what, _you survived. You did everything you needed to to recover and come out okay. But you won't take a fucking aspirin? That's where you draw the line? The smoking, okay, you're too self-indulgent to quit something like that but you can't pop a pill in the morning?"

Asami looked just slightly taken aback, jaw working the way it did when he was trying to come up with answers. There didn't seem to be any. The kitchen was quiet except for the humming of the refrigerator and Akihito sighed.

"If you could give me one good reason I don't think it would bother me as much. Right now though, all I can come up with is that you just don't care."

By the time he finished Akihito was examining the floor tiles. He didn't notice Asami coming any closer until the older man was running his hands up his arms, gentle and calming.

"You were really scared."

"Of course I was scared asshole..."

He kept his face turned away, remembering. He wanted to shudder at the thought: _Asami pulling away from, suddenly breathless in a bad way, holding his chest like his could pump the blood by hand-_

"I'm sorry."

He had slumped closer without realizing it and Asami was rubbing his back.

"Don't be sorry. Just do what I tell you..."

Asami huffed a laugh.

"Oh, incidentally," he strained, reaching for something behind Akihito without loosening his hold on him. He straitened, shaking a little bottle in front of Akihito's face. There were maybe three little pills rattling inside.

"I keep them in my briefcase."

Akihito stared, dumbfounded until he noticed Asami laughing at him.

"Why the hell would you let me keep going?"

"At first I didn't realize what you were talking about."

"And when you _did?"_

"...Sometimes it's easier to let you exhaust yourself."

That earned him a solid punch to the arm that he caught on the rebound, bringing Akihito's clenched fist to his mouth so he could kiss it.

"And I _have _cut back on the smoking."

He snatched his hand away.

"Now I know you're bullshitting me-"

"You can ask Kirishima."

Akihito narrowed his eyes and lent forward, catching him in a kiss. It was short, almost chaste, but he could barely taste the nicotine he had grown so used to.

"I'll believe you this time."

}{

_A/N:_

_Thanks so much for reading, as always let me know what you think. I might add little independent one-shots to this cause I find it very relaxing to write small contained stories._

_Hope to hear from you,_

_Isabella_


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